The use of facial recognition as a means for verifying a subject's identity in order to grant access to a restricted area or item is becoming increasingly common. Facial recognition systems known in the art include identifying or generating a picture of the subject's face, extracting facial features therefrom, and matching those features against stored data. However, this process can be slow in that it typically requires comparing the extracted facial features against all data present within a database. Furthermore, given that a facial recognition process generally does not begin until the picture of the subject's face is identified or generated, these systems often require the subject to wait some time before the process is completed. Also, these systems may not provide adequate security in that they only require one level of authentication.